|
|
Post by John B on Jun 1, 2008 11:46:20 GMT -5
1945 Univex Mercury II half-frame 35mm camera with rotary shutter (65 shots on a 36-shot roll of film). The first American camera to have a hotshoe. Check out the exposure calculator on the back: The Argus A2B. Complete with extinction meter - no light meter needed (theoretically)! |
|
|
|
Post by Cornflake on Jun 1, 2008 13:49:45 GMT -5
Interesting. Do you prefer film, John B?
|
|
|
|
Post by John B on Jun 1, 2008 14:45:37 GMT -5
I do. The problem with digital is I know what I'm going to get when I take the picture. Half the fun with film is getting back a roll that's completely ruined from light leaks. Or getting the film back and finding that one perfect shot that is far better than you remember. Discovering that your lens has a defect in the lower right hand corner that produces multiple images. Finding out that holding your breath with you elbows tight against you really did let you take a clear sot with a 1/2 second shutter speed. In short, I like film, and old oddball cameras, for their unpredictability. I like being challenged to work within (and against) a camera's limitations.
But if I want to be sure about my pictures, I use my digital. Like at IJam last year, the Rockies, seeing family, etc.
|
|
|
|
Post by sekhmet on Jun 1, 2008 21:02:02 GMT -5
Oh my, that Mercury is a gem.  |
|
|
|
Post by jdd on Jun 1, 2008 22:12:07 GMT -5
|
|
Deleted
Deleted Member
Posts: 0
|
Post by Deleted on Jun 3, 2008 8:49:09 GMT -5
Those are great little cameras, John!
I have a modest collection of old 35mm and 120 rollfilm cameras. I don't use them much anymore, but they're such marvelous machines that I keep 'em around anyway.
Tom
|
|
|
|
Post by John B on Jun 3, 2008 15:27:51 GMT -5
I'm going to build a shelf on one wall of my office to display my cameras. I'm up to a Holga, a Russian Horizon Perfekt panoramic, a Russian Moskva-5 6x9 folder, my dad and my stepdad's old 35mm SLRs, another Russian SLR, and now the Argus A2B and the Mercury II. I don't use the two SLRs from my fathers, but I keep them for sentimental reasons (and the 28mm lens and the 300mm zoom lens). I'll be adding a pinhole at some point.
One cool think about the Argus is that it uses a three-element lens that comes apart. Which means you can flip the center element for some potentially interesting out-of-focus effects at the fringes of the picture.
jdd, if you want to go halfsies, I'm in.
|
|
